The ‘torturer of Tehran’ released from custody

Beirut: Iranian authorities released a close ally of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad from custody on Wednesday, a day after the president denounced the arrest and pledged to pursue the case, the official IRNA news agency reported.

The report quoted an unnamed official as saying Saeed Mortazavi — a one-time Tehran chief prosecutor known to many as the “torturer of Tehran” and the “Butcher of the Press” — has been released.

Mortazavi has been at the centre of an escalating confrontation between Ahmadinejad and his conservative rivals in parliament ahead of the June presidential election.

His release is seen as a decision to stave off an escalation among the country’s senior officials.

There was no immediate indication of any charges against Mortazavi, who now heads the state Social Security Fund.

In a reversal that shocked Iranian activists and regime critics, Mortazavi was held on Tuesday in the same prison where he jailed and personally interrogated thousands of journalists, lawyers, students and activists.

Mortazavi, one of the Islamic Republic’s most notorious and polarising officials, was arrested on Monday night on charges that weren’t disclosed by the judiciary, according to Iranian news agencies. He was taken to Tehran’s Evin prison.

Graft investigation

The allegations against Mortazavi were related to his time as the head of a state agency that deals with retirement funds and social benefits, according to Fars News Agency.

The agency, a semi-official outlet with ties to the Revolutionary Guards Corps, said he was being investigated for corruption and embezzlement of public funds.

But the move was widely seen as a blow against Ahmadenijad in a power struggle that has pitted the president against a family that heads two of Iran’s top institutions — the parliament and the judiciary.

In a rare open confrontation on Sunday, Ahmadinejad publicly played portions of a video that appeared to show a younger brother of parliamentary speaker Ali Larijani approaching Mortazavi with a promise to provide political favours from his two powerful brothers — parliamentary speaker Ali, and Sadegh, who heads Iran’s judiciary — in exchange for bribes. Additional footage, apparently from the same video, gained wide airing on Tuesday.

The judiciary’s arrest of Mortazavi elicited protests from the president. “The judiciary is not a family organisation,” Ahmadinejad said on Tuesday. “This is a very ugly action.”

Ali and Fazel Larijani have denied the allegations. Sadegh Larijani hasn’t commented publicly.

In 2010, Iran’s parliament accused him of playing a role in the murder of three detainees in Kahrizak prison, where supporters of the opposition Green Movement were tortured the previous year.